A Psychotic Little Christmas, Day 6: Chrysanthemum in Winter

A DAY LATE BUT LETS PRETEND IT ISNT

Reaching the halfway point in the holiday VGM list, we have Chrysanthemum in Winter from Star Ocean: Till the End of Time; a game not as popular as your Marios and Zeldas, but deserving on this list nonetheless.

Fayt Leingod, just a normal guy on vacation with his friend and parents on the resort planet Hyda, faces a scary situation as the planet comes under attack. The citizens are evacuated onto a military ship in relatively quick fashion and everything seemed well, but the tragedy wasn't over, as even the ship comes under attack! His parents now missing, Fayt and his friend file into seperate escape pods and eject into the unknown.

Landing on the first planet he can, Fayt is perceived by the locals as a kind of higher being, possessing technology of a time far more advanced than theirs. After getting caught up in a string of circumstances with the residents of the town, he is located by a mysterious man named Cliff Fittir, who apparently had business with Fayt and had been following him since the Hyda incident. The two hop into Cliff's ship and leave the underdeveloped planet.

All is not well in space, as Cliff's ship comes under attack by the same people who attacked Hyda and the military ship! They crash-land on the planet Elicoor, and give themselves up to the local authorities, who presume they are enemy spies. After being busted out of prison by a mysterious woman from the opposing country, they leave the city through the sewers.

That is when this song starts playing; on some backwater planet a million miles from home, unsure of whether he'll ever see his parents again, and in the freezing cold of enemy territory, the song is both grim and atmospheric. It's a sad piece, but at the same time it manages to capture the essence of its setting and paint an audible picture, something I can commend in music.